Friday 15 May 2009

Gradual progress and a rather late delivery

Posted by Simon

Work on the gite is slowly moving forward, but I can only do so much whilst we are still waiting on prices from builders. Plus I am learning things as I go along. It is also very noticeable that doing the actual work does not seem to take long, but it is the moving everything around that takes the time or going to the builders merchants to get things. I'm sure I'll get into a routine soon.

Anyway I have started putting the beams in for the first floor but have found that the existing beams are not level so that will take some sorting out. Also I have dug up the old stone ground floor on one half of the barn. The other part is just a mud floor so I will not feel so bad digging that out.

This evening I began taking up the old floor boards and was hoping they would be re-usable for something but they are absolutely riddled with wood worm so will have to be burnt instead. I did not realise that they were so bad.

We also had delivery of the top surface sand for the boule area. Now I mention this because it was supposed to be delivered two and half weeks ago. I hadn't paid for the sand and assumed that the builders merchant (not my usual one) had decided not to deliver. Anyway early Thursday morning we got a call apologising, saying they had forgotten to deliver it and did we still want it. Well as I had not had time to order from elsewhere we said we would have it. "Okay it will be with you between 10:30 and 11:00". Fine - so at 3:45pm it turned up. Must be a French 10:30 to 11:00! I have got it sort of levelled and will try (weather permitting) to get that finished over the weekend. And weather permitting I might try have a game - or time permitting or gite permitting.

So next week I'll continue doing the flooring in the gite. Part of the roof needs repairing before I can do much else and with this in mind, hopefully, we'll have some news back from builders. If not I'll have to look at getting the septic tank or rainwater harvesting tanks in. If I can get them in.

3 comments :

  1. Ahhh, delivery men! So they're unable to read the clock in France too.
    The gite is sounding like it's showing itself to be a little more work than thought, eek! Ah, well as least Boules can take your mind off it.

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  2. If the beams are to be hidden twixt floor and ceiling then you could add chocks to get the level. We did this in one of ours and (touch wood - boom! boom!) it has worked very well.

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  3. I took some levels this morning and was pleasantly surprised. The beams are not as bad as we first thought. The main middle beam is 3.5 cms lower at one end so I will raise that and the other beam is fine. The levels I took before I removed old floorboards and joists were not good and hopefully were giving a false picture.

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